Monthly Archives: November 2012

According to my school friend Mandy, we finished Year 12 twenty years ago yesterday. Twenty years. That’s a long freaking time. That means I’ve been more years out of school than I was in it (not counting uni and work life!). It means that over half my life is post-schooling. Wow. I moved around a lot when I was a kid (ha, what’s changed?) and went to about nine different schools. My final four years though (the longest of anywhere) were all Miles High School, a country school – we had about 30 kids in our Year 12 class. I still keep in touch with a few of them, more than I probably could if it weren’t for Facebook. And while I do look back on high school with quite a lot of head shaking and “what were you THINKING?!”, and while it wasn’t always the most fun of places to be, I do have fond memories as well.

It’s been a bit of a whirlwind week. I came home from hospital on Monday and haven’t been much with it since. Baby has been a bit tricky on night sleeping and has caused a bit of havoc with feeding. I’ve sleep with him on the recliner for two nights, but last night he slept for four hours at a stretch, and he’s been quite happy to go in the cot during the day, so we’ll try the cot again tonight. I also got the expressing machine out today and got three feeds ready in advance, as a start on fixing that problem – he’s taken the bottle no worries, giving my body a break!

And to top it off, Master Two and Baby both slept this afternoon & so did I! We went out this morning (to the Maccas up the road with friends – big outing!) and walked around a bit getting a couple of jobs done too. Baby had a big awake time while we were out, and we wore him out! It was lovely to stretch out in bed this afternoon. I woke up just as a friend arrived home with Miss Seven from school (so grateful!) and both boys woke up – timing!

Am only getting emails etc via phone mostly, and not responding to much just yet – once we get some routines established hopefully can start to get back to normal!

On Thursday 8 November at 9.37am, we welcomed Daniel Rory Wessely to our family. Born by caesarean section at Launceston General Hospital, he weighed 4490g (9 pound 14), was 53cm long with a 38cm head circumference.

We’ve been getting to know our new baby over the last two days. He’s quite a lovely little fellow. Very placid, an excellent feeder, and he loves cuddles. His preferred sleeping position is on my chest 🙂 The big kids are quite enamoured and I’m looking forward to getting home so they can spend some proper time with him. Daddy is besotted, of course!

The hospital has been great – midwife for caesar was lovely, as are all the other staff. Even the food has been quite good! It’s luckily been fairly quiet for babies this past couple of days so I have had the shared twin room to myself.

We did have a few unexpected dramas – after four good pregnancies & straightforward caesars with the other three, we kept the excitement until last! I got quite nauseous during the op, which hasn’t happened in the past – this despite the anti-nausea meds prescribed by the doctor (first time!). Otherwise, all went well – uneventful day, but not long after the family all arrived for kids to meet their new baby brother (around 5pm), my heart started racing & I couldn’t stop it. Luckily a nurse was trying to take my stats at the time – she dashed for the doctor, who called a med-alert. There were about 15 people in my room within about two minutes! Apparently my heart rate went up to around 210, which is crazy. Things settled fairly quickly, but then I was on a monitor for the night (no further issues!). Doc thinks it may have been caused by dehydration (fluid loss from op) – have everyone a bit of a scare!

But that wasn’t all – bub also gave us a fright with a mucus issue which caused him to have a “dusky” event! Same poor nurse, but she was great and with some time hanging out with the nurses while I slept later on, he was fine. It’s fairly normal for caesar bubs to have mucus problems, but he was naughty & held his breath instead of getting things out! And just for one final bit of fun, after my good nap while bub was with the nurses, I woke up at 3am with a massively swollen arm! The fluids they were pushing to combat dehydration & loss caused “tissuing”, and the arm around & above the cannula puffed up crazily! They removed the line and Luckily they decided I could go without the fluids after that, and it was almost back to normal by morning.

So we had our bit of excitement! Bub and I are both fine now though. I’ve been up and about, a bit gingerly, but getting better quickly. He’s a champ – feeding well and sleeping (mostly on me but in the bassinet too!) beautifully, and wide eyed with interest when he’s awake!

We’ve had so many lovely messages from people – thank you to everyone who has texted, facebooked or tweeted – your thoughts are appreciated! And I’m taking loads of photos – thank goodness for iPhone! (Unfortunately, i can’t upload any here!) You’ll no doubt see lots more of him 🙂

Today is our last day of being a three child family. Tomorrow, I will be holding a brand new PERSON in my arms, instead of in my body, and that is pretty darn cool! Big kids, particularly Miss Seven, are pretty excited, and we are too – can’t wait to see what this little person looks like, and start to get to know him. Will he look like his siblings? Will I get the red-head I’m hoping for? Will he be as good a baby as the others were (fingers crossed!)?? A new chapter of our family’s journey is about to begin. It’s very exciting.

I’ve managed to get just about everything I aimed to do pre-baby done, which is good. Have three books sitting next to me I’d like to get the reviews written for, and there’s a basket of ironing to finish this afternoon, but I’m fairly happy with what I’ve finalised in the past few days. I could have got more done today, but chose to hang out at the Treasure Island play centre with Master Two and two friends and their offspring for about four hours, which was very nice. Will no doubt be up late again tonight (midnight last night, and still wasn’t all that sleepy when I eventually went to bed!) and it’s a 5am start for medication pre-caesarean tomorrow, then hospital by 7am. Watch for baby announcement sometime after 10am I reckon! Look forward to sharing our new bub with you 🙂 And REALLY looking forward to being able to bend over, and tie my shoelaces, again!

Today was the final day of my contract for the university sessional work I was doing. Of course, I’ll still monitor the forum for a couple more days, and I’m running a pre-exam chat for the students on Sunday, but I’m officially done. And that means officially unemployed, for the first time in a LONG time. I haven’t been formally jobless since we moved to WA, and even then I was actually still on the books with the QLD Education Department when we moved, and I got my job at Kolbe within two days of touchdown in Perth! It’s a little odd, especially knowing that I’m really not going to be in a position to look for a permanent job (outside of work I can do from home, with two small children underfoot) for at least two years (when Master Two hits school) or longer. Not bad odd, but I really am not sure how I feel about not having a steady pay coming in right now. It usually makes me rather nervous, which makes me find work, even when I shouldn’t really do that! Hopefully that feeling will go away come Thursday when new baby arrives and keeps me too busy for silly thoughts 🙂

We’ve had a pretty social week – I finally finished the marking last Friday, and revelled in the “no more marking” haze over the weekend. Saturday the kids and I went out to the Flinthart residence at Scottsdale for a catch up, as we hadn’t seen the clan for a number of weeks. Very nice day indeed! Sunday was apparently party day – Master Nine had a friend’s birthday to attend, while Miss Seven later went to a Hallowe’en party (I’m not a Hallowe’en fan, but her entire class was invited). Between chauffeuring them about, we visited the local park where I got very cross over the way some local teens have ownership of the kids’ playground, particularly when one decided she could reprimand M7 for USING THE EQUIPMENT!!! Grrrr, Mummy Hulk saw RED! Spoke strongly to said teen and her friends about their lack of respect, and came home and wrote a letter to the newspaper. No idea if it has been published, but it made me feel better!

Took M2 swimming on Monday, had a very relaxing day wandering in Launceston city on Tuesday (got my hair done and a few other bits and bobs, as well as had a hospital appointment – finally got to see the maternity ward!), drove out to Fingal and St Marys with a friend to see the schools on Wednesday, had a very quiet day at home on Thursday (child-free but didn’t achieve much – think I just needed a day off!) and visited again this morning before spending much of the afternoon shopping for M9’s upcoming school camp. We’ve been pretty social when we can, knowing that we’ll be a bit more limited for a couple of weeks after baby. My aunt is coming to help for a few days later this week, which will be fantastic, but recovery from the caesarean will mean I will need to ease back on the gallivanting a little. Hopefully people will come visit me!